Category: Magazine

Watch for new juxtapositions, fresh interpretation, and new ways of engaging with the Walters collections. This summer, beginning June 23, the galleries housing 19th-century art on the fourth floor of the Centre Street building will be closed for renovation.

We’re on the move. Watch for new juxtapositions, fresh interpretation, and new ways of engaging with the Walters collections.

This summer, beginning June 23, the galleries housing 19th-century art on the fourth floor of the Centre Street building will be closed for reinstallation. The fourth floor will reopen October 26 with a new installation focused on the life and legacy of the museum’s founders, William T. (1819–1894) and Henry (1848–1931) Walters. Special member hours will be Thursday, October 23, from 4 to 9 p.m. and Saturday, October 25, from 5 to 10 p.m.

Discovered in a box among photographs of unnamed, unidentified and forgotten African American men, women and children, it is the only known photograph of the American sculptor taken in Rome, and probably dates around 1874–76. Although no one in the shop understood my ecstatic reaction, I knew that prior to this discovery, there existed only seven known photographs of Mary Edmonia Lewis (1844–1907), all taken at the same sitting in Chicago around 1868–70, by photographer Henry Rocher

“Edmonia Lewis, the colored sculptor, residing in Rome . . . is below medium height; her complexion and feautures [sic] betray her African origin; her hair is more of the Indian type, black straight and abundant … her face is bright, intelligent, and expressive . . . She is one of the most interesting of our American women artists here, and we are glad to know that she is fast winning fame and fortune.”